A good meal is meant to be shared.
One of my good friends recently celebrated her birthday with a brunch. It was incredible. Brunch = best meal ever and when shared with dear friends--utter perfection. So thankful for friends, birthdays, food and bacon. Ugh. Wonderful saturday morning.
Below was my contribution. Relatively simple fruit salad. There is a lot of room for substitutions and it tasted wonderful! I went to a grocery that didn't carry dried figs so I substituted in raisins. It worked but I can only imagine how much better it will be with figs. Yummm in the tumm!
Winter Fruit Salad
adapted from smitten kitchen
3/4 cup sugar
3 star anise (1 1/2 teaspoon if using ground anise)
1/2 of a plump vanilla bean, split in half lengthwise
8 dried Turkish apricots, halved
4 dried figs, quarters (or use 1/4 cup raisins)
4 2-in long pieces lemon zest from a Meyer lemon (peeled with a vegetable peeler)
Juice from the zest lemon
3 firm pears
1 firm tart apple
seeds from half a pomegranate
Fill a saucepan with 4 cups of water. Add the sugar, anise, vanilla bean and lemon zest. Bring to a boil and cook until sugar is dissolved. Let it cool for a couple minutes and then stir in the apricots and figs. Allow it completely cool (I stuck my saucepan in the freezer).
While the sauce is cooling, thinly slice the pears and apple (you can peel them too if you'd like). Put them in a large bowl and toss with lemon juice.
Once syrup is cooled, poor over the apples and pears. Cover the bowl with plastic wrap and chill overnight.
The next morning, place the fruit into your serving bowl using a slotted spoon. Gently mix in the pomegranate seeds and serve! You can leave the vanilla beans and lemon peels if you'd like for good aesthetics :)
bon appetit!
